Everybody Grows Up Sometime

Summary: Secrets in Sam's life lead to a discussion of what she's doing with her life.

Rating: PG-13

Disclaimer: I do not own Danny Phantom. Butch Hartman does.

Dedication: To Moody Maud, Hope your birthday is something special!

Danny smiled again trying to ignore the fact that the bright Friday night football lights were blinding him. The football players held their helmets and the cheerleaders held roses that the sports boosters had given them. Those who weren't involved in fall sports, like Danny, just stood there. "Everyone one last round of applause for the Class of 2007."

The clapping slowly died, then they went back to pre-game announcements. Danny followed everyone off the football field. Tucker sighed from where he stood next to him alphabetically. "Photos are done, now comes the meet-and-greet portion." Danny just turned and smiled at him as they filed off the field.

No sooner were they off when his father slipped an arm around his neck. "I'm so proud of you, son. Senior night. Of course you're not as involved as your sister, but still."

"Thanks, Dad...I think." He blinked against the flash of light. His mother grinned at him, lowering the camera, followed shortly by Tucker's parents coming over. The adults talked and the two teens laughed about the way the cheerleaders hadn't had time to do their make-up and were complaining about it.

"So where are the Manson's?" Danny looked over at Tucker. "I figured they'd drop in and say hi."

"You didn't hear? They had a major fight in front of Sam last night. I guess her mom let it slip that Sam isn't hers."

Danny raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean 'isn't hers'?"

Tucker shrugged. "I guess Mr. Manson had an affair and the woman dumped Sam on him."

"When did you find this out?" Danny sounded mortified, even to his own ears. Tucker looked embarrassed.

"She called me last night in tears."

Danny's eyes went wide; he couldn't help it. "She called you?"

Tucker shook his head. "I know. I thought if anything she'd call you."

"So where are they?"

Tucker glanced over at him. "Sam said she told them not to come."

Danny hissed between his teeth. "Your kidding," he muttered. "But Sam was all hyped up about this being our chance to be recognized as the senior class."

Tucker just shook his head. "I guess things can happen that change your life," he said. "You know that better than anyone."

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Sam pulled her knees up and wrapped her arms around them. She leaned against the tree and stared through the chain-link fence at all the laughing people, cheering fans as the teams came out, and screaming children. She watched a particular little girl try to get her dad's attention by pulling at his coat. He waved her away and continued talking.

Tears welled up in violet eyes as she stared out at them. She wanted to march out there and shake him tell his teeth rattled. Part of her said she didn't know where the feeling came from but Sam couldn't help but remember all the times she'd pulled at her dad's jacket, wanting him to look at her finger painting or spelling quiz and tell her it was good. He would just wave her away and march off to some board meeting.

She'd never had a really father figure and now her mother wasn't hers and said she had never wanted to be. She glanced over by the forty-yard line where both her friends and their parents, barely visible from this angle. She felt a wave of jealous sweep over her. Danny's parents were ghost hunters but they still doted on their half-ghost son. If they could still love Danny, why couldn't her parents love her?

She rested her check on her knee and shivered the late September air getting cold as the sun sank. She looked at the lights, tears blurring them into little white cross-shaped streaks as she squinted. She took a shaky breath and closed her eyes. Last night replayed in her head, words sounding as clear as if her mother was standing there screaming them.

The fence in front of her rattled and her eyes flew open. "Is there a reason you're back here crying and missing your only Senior Night?" Danny stood there, forehead resting against the metal links, fingers interlaced through the different diamond shaped wire openings.

She wiped furiously at the tears with the back of her hand. "It's nothing." Danny glanced quickly over both shoulders. Seeing that no one was paying particular attention to the two seventeen-year-olds, he quickly went intangible and passed through the fence. "One of these days you're going to get caught."

He shrugged drooping to the ground next to her. "Everybody would just think they were seeing things and blow it off." The two seniors sat there in silence for a moment. She could feel his gaze on her but she resolutely stared at a starburst wrapper that was caught on the fence. "You want to tell me what's wrong?"

Sam shook her head, the two red and black ribbons in her hair dancing slightly. "It's not your problem."

There was a second before he answered, his voice sounding much more sincere than normal. "If it's bothering you, it's bothering me."

"Whatever," she murmured, as if that would cause the whole conversation to cease. She stared up for a moment. The autumn moon had an almost copper color to it. On any other night it would have been pretty. She tried to laugh it came out as a half sob. "It's not like Tucker didn't tell you."

Danny fell silent for a moment. "Shouldn't he?" Sam looked over at him and instantly knew it was a mistake. His sky blue eyes seemed so much dark and infinitely deeper in the semi-darkness.

Sam swallowed. "I don't know. It's easier to not have to tell you."

"But you could tell Tucker, you just couldn't tell me." She couldn't help but hear the betrayal in his voice.

She turned to face him. His expression had changed in that instant she hadn't been looking. His jaw was set firmly and his eyes screamed at her as if she had stabbed him in the back. She looked away. "It's not like that."

"Oh, and how is it not?" Sam pulled her knees closer to her, the damp ground soaking into her jeans. She rested her check against her knee turning away from him. He sighed. "I didn't mean it to come out like that. It just hurts that you could tell Tucker and not me."

She shook her head. "It's not that I couldn't tell you. It's just Tucker leaves me to handle my own problem, where as you take it on yourself to help me solve it."

She glanced over at him. The lights from the field fell over his features and making a stark contrast between the dark shadows and the bright light. Her breath caught in her throat. Why didn't she ever notice that he was growing up? It was almost impossible to believe that he was the same little bright eyed boy who'd befriended the quiet little girl in kindergarten. Moisture gathered in her downcast eyes. "When did everything change?"

He looked over at her. Blue eyes almost seemed to glow in the shadows and ambient light. "What do you mean?"

She bit her lip. "When did everything stop being easy? When things like this didn't happen?"

"Is this about your parents," he questioned gently. Sam wiped furiously at her tears, pressing almost painfully against her cheekbone with enough pressure to bruise it.

"No," she looked up at him only to look back down. "I don't know." She looked up the copper color of the moon melting into more of a gold that would slowly turn into silver as the game stretched on. "It just scares me."

She felt Danny's warm hand rest on her shoulder. It felt unnaturally warm compared to the cold tingling that was all she felt. "What scares you?"

"Nothing," she breathed, turning to look at him. She instantly almost drowned in his earnest blue eyes. "Everything." This time Danny didn't ask her to explain but his palm began rubbing small, perfect circles on her shoulder blade. She took that as his silent encouragement for her to continue. "It's as if I just woke up for the first time, and figured out the dream I had been living up until now was all a lie."

She sighed. "I don't expect you to understand. I couldn't expect you to understand even if I wanted you too. The people I always thought loved and cared about me don't."

"They still care," he whispered, which was almost lost as a cheer rose from the high school football fans as the Ravens made first and ten. Both seventeen-year-olds looked up at the cheering fans.

Sam ran a finger across her lower eyelid. "Maybe. I don't get it, Danny. I've always been the one that was so excited about getting out of this stupid town. And now I'm almost free of it and I'm petrified."

"You'll be fine." He started to say more but seemed to trail off when Sam shook her head.

"If I would have been fine, why am I so scared to leave?"

The hand slid from her shoulder blade and Danny dropped it back to his side. "At least you can leave," he murmured bitterly.

A wave of guilt instantly washed over Sam. This was a topic they'd discussed before and every time it came up she wished it wouldn't. Danny was stuck her, chained to the machine that had already ruined his life. He would have given anything to be able to leave, follow his dream, but he was denied that. Sam felt a fresh tear burn it's way down her frozen cheek. "I'm sorry," she whispered.

He shook his head. "It's nothing you did. I was the one stupid enough to wander into that stupid machine." They sat there in silence for a moment. "Maybe your afraid of what your leaving behind."

Sam swallowed the lump in her throat. She leaned over towards him, her head falling limply against her shoulder. "I'm not scared of leaving my parents," she scoffed.

"I didn't mean that," he whispered. His breath felt warm against the side of her cheek and Sam shuddered slightly. "I meant just having to face a whole new day to day life. Never have to spend seven solid hours in CHS. Not have to put up with Tucker and me being idiots at the movies. Never have to go ghost hunting with me." His voice seemed to trail of on the last one.

Sam pulled back slightly to look at him. "You're going to be battling ghost all by yourself," she whispered.

He shot her a look before looking away. "It's not a new concept," he murmured with a shrug.

But to Sam suddenly it was. He wouldn't have anyone to cover for him. If he got hurt, there was no one to help make sure he got home. There was no one to stop him from doing those crazy suicidal missions he got his mind set on sometimes. There was no one to watch him.

Sam suddenly felt guilty for leaving him here to face all that alone. He needed someone who he knew he could trust, who could get his back for him. Like me, she thought bitterly. She instantly shooed that thought away. This was her chance to be free of everything she had always been, to leave this town where she was "that rich guys daughter". Go somewhere and start over again. To be totally free of all those bonds that had been killing her for the past few years.

The crowd gave another large cheer drowning out the sound of her sigh. "I'll go out of my mind worrying about you."

"You shouldn't." He said, but he sounded anything but sure. Danny always had been lousy at lying. It was somehow comforting to know that four years of living a secret life hadn't changed that.

"Don't change on me," she whispered. He looked over, blinking a few times at the sudden change in topic.

He smiled a sort of slow smile that didn't reach his eyes. "Everyone changes, Sam. You've changed just as much as anyone else."

She tucked dark brown hair behind her ear. "Why does that scary me suddenly? It never scared me before."

"You never let it before," he stated simply.

She whirled, turning so that she faced him. "Are you saying I'm letting it scare me now?"

He looked far off, the distant football lights casting highly contrasted shadows across his face. The chain link shadows giving him a sort of haunted look. "Maybe." He reached a hand up and rubbed the back of his neck. "We're growing up, Sammy."

Her mood lifted a miniscule amount at the use of the child hood nickname. "I never would have guessed," she breathed, a hint of her old sardonic speech pattern creeping up on them both.

"Everybody's got to grow up sometime, I guess."

She looked down. "I thought we'd already done that."

A hand brushed against her cheek, lingering slightly against the evaporating tear streaks. "We've started growing up. We're just not quite there yet."

"How do you know when you're grown up?" She murmured. "I mean a week ago, I would have sworn I was an adult, that stuff like my parentage wouldn't have bothered me."

He lifted her chin and she forced her lilac eyes to meet his earnest ice-blue ones. "Of course it would. It attacks the very core of who you are."

"And who do you think I am?" She swallowed unable to look away.

He smiled, this one reaching his eyes, which were the only thing she was focused on at the moment. "I don't think I know you, I do. Your Sam Manson; the little brown haired girl who thought she could fly; The fourth grader who told me she was going to change the world; the sophomore who told me that we couldn't ever be more than friends. You're a beautiful young women who will get whatever she wants out of life."

She swallowed as he moved in closer unable to look away. "How can you see that in me? I'm some 'damned affair child' that nobody wants."

His eyes seemed to darken a shade, "I want you."

"No, you don't," she whispered.

He shook his head minutely, his face only inches from hers now. "You have no idea what I want."

Sam watched wordlessly as he leaned forward and kissed her. She moaned in protest but didn't pull away. This couldn't happen. This is what she had been fighting against since seventh grade. This could wreck everything between them. She pulled back slightly resting her forehead against his.

"You can't want this."

His blue eyes opened only inches from hers, a darker color than Sam ever remembered seeing them. "If I could have what I want, Sam, you wouldn't be sitting here crying. I wouldn't be facing being a half-ghost alone next year. And you wouldn't be walking away from me."

"I'm not walking away." Even Sam could here the catch in her voice.

He searched her gaze piercingly. "That's exactly what you're doing. Why are you leaving, Sam?"

She swallowed. "What do you mean?"

"You have always said you have to get away from Amity Park, not your parents, Amity Park. You're running from something," he said.

"I am not," she countered, but her statement lacked the conviction his had.

Danny shook his head, blue eyes gleaming intently, as if he could see things about her that even she couldn't. "You are, Sam. You asked me what you're afraid of? I could tell you, but you're not going to like my answer."

She swallowed. "I'm not afraid of staying," she whispered. "I'm afraid of what would happen if I do."

"And what do you think is going to happen," he whispered, his voice lower than usually.

She shuddered, and he smiled slightly. "That I'll do something stupid, and wreck our lives like mine wrecked my parents."

"We're not your parents, Sam," he bit out.

She shook her head. "But nothing good ever comes out of things like that."

"Of course it does! My parents fell in love after high school. They're happy. Jazz and I are happy. Not all love ends in affairs and divorce, Sam."

She looked away, no longer able to take his gaze. "You don't want to fall in love with me."

"It's a little late for that," he murmured.

She snapped her head up, a spark of anger obvious in the lavender depths. "And what am I supposed to do? Just sit here and live with you happily ever after?"

His eyes narrowed. "I expect you to trust me enough to take me at my word that I won't hurt you."

"You can't promise me something like that."

Blue eyes drifted closed and rigid shoulder seemed to drop in defeat. "You're right. I can't. But what I do promise is that I think our friendship is strong enough to survive anything we go through." Sam bit her lip, unsure of where to go from there. "Finding out your life isn't what you thought it was hurts, Sam. I know. Believe me, I do. I don't want to lose you over this."

Sam sighed. "You won't lose me."

"I already have. You're leaving. You're giving up before you start."

Sam looked away. She turned her back to him and stared out at the white lights. Her gaze drifted back to the little girl whose dad had been ignoring her. She was now situated on her dad's shoulders, clapping and laughing. Sam didn't have to be like her parents. She could be whoever she wanted to be. "It wouldn't be easy," she whispered.

"I wouldn't expect it to be," he replied. "Nothing that's worth it is."

Sam sighed. "You can't just give up on me, cause that's what I'll want you to do."

"I wouldn't," he murmured. "I never have." She turned and seeing the hope in his eyes, felt her reserve crumble. "You really mean this? A really try at a relationship."

Sam nodded. "A really try at a relationship. We'll see where we end up." She smiled shakily, shoving her insecurities away. "Now, try and convince me this was a good thing."

Blue eyes lit up as he wrapped an arm around her, pulling her close. "Whatever you want, Sam."